Chapter 7 - Tên Chapter 7 - Bloodlines and Broken Ledgers
The aftermath was chaos. The wedding reception disintegrated into panicked whispers, fleeing politicians, and hysterical socialites grabbing their fur coats. By two in the afternoon, the Grand Ballroom was empty, save for the wilted flowers, smashed champagne flutes, and the hotel's cleaning crew picking up the debris.
I sat on the edge of the service stage, kicking off my torturous high heels and rubbing my swollen arches. My body ached with sheer exhaustion, but my mind was spinning at a million miles an hour.
""You should be resting,"" a deep voice came from the shadowed wings of the stage.
Lorenzo walked out, his bow tie undone, his crisp collar open to reveal the base of his neck. He held two cardboard coffee cups from the corner diner down the street, along with a brown paper bag smelling heavenly of powdered sugar and fried dough.
""Coffee and cannoli,"" he said, holding one out to me. ""Real ricotta. Not the fake pastry cream they serve to the tourists.""
I looked at him, completely baffled. ""You’re an international crime boss who just brought down a billionaire tech investor, and you went to Taylor Street to buy me cannoli?""
""I keep my promises,"" Lorenzo sat down on the edge of the stage right next to me. His thigh pressed against mine, solid, warm, and comforting. ""And you earned more than cannoli today, Rosie.""
I took a bite of the pastry. The shell was crisp, the filling rich with cinnamon and orange zest. I groaned in genuine bliss, closing my eyes. ""Heaven.""
Lorenzo watched me with an intensity that made the coffee in my hands tremble. ""You have your grandmother's eyes. Unflinching. She once stared down my father with a butcher knife in her hand when he tried to overcharge her father for olive oil imports.""
""Why did she hide it from me, Lorenzo?"" I asked, looking out over the empty, cavernous room. ""Why did she let us live in a cramped basement apartment on the West Side, working double shifts at diners, when she knew all of this? Why didn't she take the money from Trapani?""
Lorenzo went quiet for a moment, sipping his black coffee. ""Because gold comes with ghosts, Rosie. Your grandfather was murdered because of that ledger. Lucia took you and fled halfway across the world because she wanted you to have a life where you never had to look over your shoulder every time a black town car slowed down at the curb.""
Tears pricked behind my eyelids. All those years, I had thought Nonna was just eccentric—hoarding cash in coffee cans, teaching me accounting using old butcher slips, drilling Sicilian dialects into my head until my tongue hurt. She wasn't being eccentric. She was training me to survive.
""And now I'm dragged right back into it,"" I whispered bitterly.
""No,"" Lorenzo said firmly, reaching out and gently tilting my chin until our gazes locked. ""You’re not dragged into anything. Jonathan Vance is finished. Dante is on a cargo ship heading back to the Mediterranean to face tribal justice. The federal regulators have the paper trail they need to seize Vance's assets. You are clean, Rosie. You saved my family’s reputation, and you protected my territory.""
He reached inside his coat pocket and pulled out a thick cashier's check, sliding it onto my lap.
I looked down at the numbers. Five hundred thousand dollars. Double what he had promised.
""I can't take this,"" I breathed, my heart skipping beats. ""It’s too much.""
""It’s not enough for what you did,"" Lorenzo said softly, his thumb gently stroking the curve of my jawline. His eyes were dark, filled with a raw, possessive hunger that stole the breath from my lungs. ""You showed me something I haven't seen in this city for thirty years. Loyalty, brilliance, and a woman who refuses to break.""
May you like
""Lorenzo...""
""Don't run from me, Rosie,"" he whispered, leaning closer until his lips were a breath away from mine. ""Because for the first time in my life, I found a queen who actually knows how to rule.""
